We all get that too much stress can have a negative impact on the quality of our daily lives, but how is it possible to strike a balance between work and life when everyday is Blursday?

At Fierce Conversations, the positive steps we take toward better work-life balance start with conversations and communication to diminish anxiety levels and enrich relationships. Discover simple hacks that can turn pressure into motivation and free up precious time in your day.

In this Forbes article, Fierce CEO Ed Beltran discusses the importance of taming stress and striking a healthy balance in work and in life.

Read: How To Offset Stress And Achieve Work-Life Balance

 

 

Do you ever notice yourself or your team side-stepping “problem” employees, soft-pedaling critical feedback, or avoiding conversations all together?

Do you walk around with proverbial marks on your forehead from banging it against the wall over and over again, wishing those employees – the people in your work life that literally drive you crazy – would wake up tomorrow morning being new and improved?

Many leaders and companies today admit to suffering from a culture of “nice” where people are afraid to speak openly or confront others’ behavior. Unfortunately, it’s not as simple as just wishing these individuals away. (If only it were!) Each day we wake up to the same frustrations with a new dent in the wall and another painful bump on the head.

Toxic employees are a reality in many workplaces, and they come with a heavy price.

Fierce surveyed over a thousand employees and executives in multiple organizations that ranged from healthcare to education, from manufacturing to the financial sector. 

Here are a few highlights of our findings:

78% of employees say that negative attitudes are extremely debilitating to team morale. 

17% of those surveyed say negative attitudes increase stress. 

27% of employees say that negative attitudes decrease productivity.

While it is often easier to avoid or ignore toxicity in your organization, when it starts to impact corporate culture and well-being, it’s time to shift gears.

Let’s acknowledge what’s true: negative environments create workarounds. We tiptoe around the problem. We work hard to avoid the individual who is creating the toxicity. News flash, avoidance does not actually help the situation. In fact, if we were to be honest with ourselves, avoiding the issue only increases our own stress. It also increases our distraction level. And if we stop for a moment to do the math, we quickly realize just how much time is being taken away from getting the real work done. Stress, distraction, and lack of productivity – does this sound like the kind of company culture you want to be a part of? I didn’t think so.

So what can we do?

At Fierce, we have 7 Principles that serve as the cornerstone for how to engage in the most successful conversations to help tackle toxicity. One of them is this:

Take responsibility for your emotional wake

Check yourself – how are you showing up? It might not surprise you that any highly stressed or over-worked individual can begin to behave in ways that are viewed by others as negative. Modeling the same behavior you are looking to change is not contributing to your success. Consider your own impact. Ask yourself, “How do people feel about conversations with me after I leave the room?”

When we are not mindful of our wake, when we’re consumed by our own stress or overwork or disengagement, we can actually become the toxic employee we are trying to avoid. This principle helps us be more mindful of our own behavior – and then take responsibility for it.

So the first step is to check in with ourselves. What’s next? There are two Fierce conversations we need to invite in order to best deal with others who have not taken responsibility for their emotional wake.

Feedback

One of the best ways in which we deal with toxic, negative employees is by giving feedback and learning how to receive feedback in the moment to create awareness.

Feedback is when we name what we’re seeing and experiencing, in order to give the other person an opportunity to better understand themselves…and hopefully grow and change.

Too often, though, especially with toxic employees, we’ve let things go unchecked for a very long time. The negative environment has taken root. And now a different conversation is needed.

Confrontation

As Robert Redford once said, “Knowing something is easy, saying it out loud is the hard part.” Confrontation conversations are NOT easy. In fact, these are often the very conversations we put off, make excuses for, avoid, or tiptoe around. We are THAT uncomfortable with them. And there are legitimate reasons to be scared about having some conversations. Let’s be honest – some people do not react well when confronted, regardless of how eloquent and thoughtful you are. This is reality. However, what is also reality is that the cost of not having the conversation is much greater than the risk of it going badly. These needed conversations have a huge impact on performance. As the saying goes, we get what we tolerate. When we don’t confront behavior, we, our team, our culture continues to suffer.

So, if you feel a conversation is needed, then likely it is. And for those of you worried about the failed conversation, remember this – a careful conversation IS a failed conversation because it merely postpones the conversation that wants and needs to take place.

Some of the best practices that we’ve seen make the biggest impact are when individuals – and cultures – develop their feedback-giving and receiving skills at all levels and when they don’t avoid confrontation, but step into it with courage, skill, and grace. When that happens, a healthy culture is built – one that is conversation-rich.

It’s important to invite feedback or confrontation conversations with the people we view as toxic. You cannot ignore the problem and hope it goes away. I promise you it won’t, and it will continue to erode the culture and well-being of the organization and those who choose to show up every day.

When we have tough conversations, when we practice them to build our capacity and muscle, we can turn toxic employees into engaged team members. We can then create a culture we all want to be a part of.

 

Work-related stress can have a number of causes, including fear-based cultures that leave employees anxious about their performance, ineffective or insufficiently trained leadership, unmanageable workloads, and unaddressed relational issues between colleagues.

Moreover, stress directly affects work quality and productivity: 53% of Americans say stress dampens their productivity in the workplace (MHS), and workers experiencing high levels of stress may be more liable to commit errors in their work (RoSPA).

So how can you improve your workplace culture, reduce stress, and boost productivity all at the same time? Start with these six steps:

1. Make room for white space.

Creating white space is about more than taking an occasional break — it’s about committing to taking intentional pauses before and after meetings or between tasks for thoughtful reflection. Make white space a part of your organization’s culture. Communicate its value and encourage employees to make it part of their work day.

White space is so important in our daily life that Juliet Funt — one of our past speakers at the Fierce Summit — created Whitespace at Work. Her firm provides solutions for organizations wanting to avoid burnout and maximize the amount of unscheduled time employees have to simply think and strategize. To quote Funt, “When a company adds WhiteSpace to its culture, every single employee benefits. You can almost hear an audible sigh of relief as a path is cleared for strategic thinking and focus.”

2. Deliver what employees really want.

Avoid making assumptions about what employees want. While happy hours and an office pool table may be great additions, these types of perks only scratch the surface of what are much less superficial needs. Surveys reveal that today’s workforce craves a sense of purpose and meaning, development opportunities, and work-life balance.

If you want your workplace culture to be successful, building emotional capital and trust across your organization is essential. Ask questions to gain understanding, have coaching conversations, and listen intently. Support the need for personal and professional growth by providing learning opportunities.

3. Assess workloads and employee capacity.

Approximately 46% of employee stress is caused by excessive workloads. This is a pervasive problem in many organizations, and one that needs to be addressed. Excessive workloads can cause issues at all levels of an organization, burdening leadership, teams, and individuals.

This step probably doesn’t sit well with organizations that are trying to accomplish a lot with very few resources . While maximizing employee capacity can be beneficial, especially in times of transition, overburdening employees with massive workloads isn’t worth saving a dollar when stress takes over your culture. If bringing on an extra hire or perhaps a freelancer can help alleviate some of the burdens, strongly consider making this investment.

4. Allow mental health days.

52% of workers say their company does not do enough to promote employee health, including mental health. Whether you call them “mental health days” or simply allow them to be a part of existing sick days, it’s essential to honor the need for recovery and downtime. If an employee feels exhausted after completing an extensive project, it will be better for productivity overall if they’re able to take some time to regenerate…and return to work bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.

In a healthy culture, there is no shame in employees recognizing when they need a break and asking for one. The alternative is dire — stressed-out team members who don’t feel comfortable asking for what they need, resulting in subpar performance, and ultimately leaving your organization.

5. Make it about the journey, not the destination.

We’re all on a journey, both individually and collectively, and strong leaders will support their teams as needed. Offer avenues for growth as part of this journey rather than placing all of the focus on outcomes.

In a Deloitte survey, 82% of respondents said making a workplace error causes stress. This creates a vicious cycle — errors cause stress, and then stress leads to more error. If employees anticipate some form of punishment or feel they have no wiggle room to experiment or make mistakes, culture will suffer, innovation and creativity will suffer, and stress levels will rise. As a leader, you have to be willing to allow employees, and yourself, to fail. Failure is part of taking risks, and it’s an important part of how we learn and grow.

6. Make conversation training a priority.

Work-related stress is a major factor in whether people like their jobs or not. A survey from About.com found that among the top three reasons why people do not like their jobs, 62% of responses were communication-related. Communication frustration leads to an unsatisfied workforce.

When problems remain unaddressed, they show up in our lives as stress. If leaders don’t know how to have authentic and effective conversations to address issues, this weighs on individuals, teams, and cultures.

One way to ensure that leadership has the know-how to have the conversations that matter is to implement organization-wide conversations training. Conversation that’s competent, skillful, and effective is a powerful resource in business, and it’s critical for solving your toughest challenges.

For the sake of culture, health, and productivity, take the necessary steps to reduce stress in your organization and get rid of fear-based practices now — before larger issues arise that are harder or even impossible to repair. Doing so will lead to positive results in relationships, revenue, and overall employee satisfaction.

If your organization has yet to roll out a conversations training program, you can still get a head start on the conversations you need to start having today.

Learn more in our infographic: 7 Self-Care Ideas for the Workplace

 

 

Have you ever watched a toddler try to run after something she wants? Her little legs typically can’t keep up with her desire to “get there already.” She’ll be moving at break-neck speed and before you know it, she’s on her knees, dazed and confused, wondering how she went from having her feet on the ground, to having her feet by her ears.

I was a pretty rough and tumble kid myself. My mom still jokes that my baby shoes are so battered and torn, it’s a wonder the little feet they carried are still functioning. I attribute this wear and tear to two things: loving life and wanting to eat up every moment I could and wanting to do everything as fast as possible.

I reflect on that kid a lot now as an older and wiser professional. I try so hard to tell myself to “slow down” for fear of scraping my proverbial knees. And yet, I still feel myself being pulled into the race – trying to be the first, the best, the winner.

In the professional culture we live in today, it is hard NOT to move quickly. This is especially true when working remotely because of the internal pressure we tend to put on ourselves. We feel as if we need to continuously prove our value when we’re physically unseen.

In order to keep up with and outshine the competition, we rush to complete our goals, often while multitasking. On top of rushing through our day-to-day tasks, we find ourselves rushing to our work, rushing in and out of meetings, and rushing to get knock out our tasks to meet deadlines. Our professional “knees” are taking quite a beating.

So, what’s the problem? 

Faster is better right? Not necessarily. In fact, while so many of us are moving at lightning speed these days, we are also finding ourselves suffering because of it.

Think about this – how do you feel when you are told to “move faster” or “it needs to be done yesterday.” If these words cause you anxiety, rest assured it’s a natural human response. Our bodies are reminding us of the many falls we’ve taken when moving too fast.

The reality is, impatience and time urgency can cause stress. It activates our sympathetic nervous system, which is our more primitive “survival” system. When we hurry, it can feel like we’re being chased by a cheetah.

If we stay in this state for too long, it can lead to chronic stress which is proven to have negative health effects and does nothing for improving performance in the long term.

In a former life, I spent over a decade at a global retail organization – If you want to find an industry where speed is rewarded, retail is the place to look. Did you know your local checkout clerk is taught to “race the clock” with how many items they can scan in a minute?

After an eight-hour day of trying to “out scan” your fellow employees, work can become downright exhausting, and the words “pick up the pace”? Well, they can make you want to throw that kumquat you are trying like heck to remember the name of, at the person barking those words, which of course, is not helpful or advised.

Much like the worn-out clerk, too much rushing can push teams and organizations to a similar breaking point. We spend so much time competing for speed, we lose sight of the “why” behind the work and also each other.

For the sake of our culture, our relationships, and our physical and mental well-being, we need to learn to slow down. 

An important question to ask ourselves is, where are we trying to go? And perhaps more importantly, how do we get there in one piece?

Efficiency vs. Urgency

For the sake of managing performance, it’s important to distinguish between two concepts: urgency and efficiency. Urgency requires haste and is defined by the speed in which we get things done. It puts the quality of our work at risk and perpetuates feelings of stress. Efficiency, on the other hand, allows us to maintain our energy and doesn’t involve rushing. Efficiency requires that we intentionally “slow down to speed up.”

This involves maximizing our resources in order to complete projects or tasks in the most accurate and effective way. It’s having the necessary conversations to manage our resources and our time without the cattle prod or the skinned knees.

Having the right conversations and knowing how to train your employees how to have them is a non-negotiable component of efficiency. It can save individuals, teams and organizations time, money, and a whole lot of personal stress, while increasing productivity, improving performance, and getting us to the results we want.

Don’t believe me?

According to Deloitte, one sign of positive change in performance management is a rise in employee-driven communication rather than one-way feedback. Increasing the quantity and quality of conversations through training is becoming a key to both team and manager success.

To truly drive value, the experts are telling us we need to be teaching employees how to start having ongoing high-quality and supportive conversations between each other and their teams.

So, how do you slow down enough to be able to teach employees how to have the necessary conversations with their teams? Here are some valuable pointers to help improve the efficiency of your employees:

1. Teach them to stop multitasking.

RESEARCH SHOWS that monotaskers are generally more productive than multitaskers, and mono-tasking results in fewer mistakes. On top of that, multitasking can have a significant impact on trust and relationships in the workplace.

Consider what happens when someone messages or calls you to discuss an “important matter” and you are in the middle of that report you should have had to your boss 30 minutes ago. You are feeling rushed, pressed for time, you are clearly stressed. That said, the colleague in front of you seems to be gravely concerned and his matter seems just as urgent.

So, you do what you think is best – try to tend to both items at the same time. The trouble is, you are distracted by your report. You aren’t fully listening and the message you are sending to your colleague is “your matter isn’t important enough for me to stop what I’m doing and really focus on you.”

This does not mean you need to drop everything when someone wants to chat. But you need to consider how you are showing up and the example you’re setting for your employee.

What if your response to your employee was, “This matter sounds important. Give me 20 minutes to finish this report so I can give you and this conversation the attention it needs.” Or “what are you doing at 11 a.m.? Let’s meet then and give ourselves the time and the attention this needs.”

To change multitasking habits and build the monotasking muscle for ourselves and to teach our employees how to do the same, we need to encourage eliminating distractions to focus attention on one thing at a time. We must protect the time needed to do that task or have that conversation, block time on our calendar, close all other screens, put our phone on mute.  Relationships, performance, and the overall well-being of ourselves and our employees will be better for it.

2. Encourage time for positive feedback.

David Rock, founder of the Neuroleadership Institute says “positive feedback is a signal to the brain to do more of something. When we acknowledge, we highlight the behaviors we want to see more of, and at the same time, we build the other person’s confidence and certainty around what they are doing well.”

And yet, think about it. Most of us rush through or skim over the positive stuff. We say things like “great job!” or “way to go!” and “time to set our sights on what’s next!”

If recognition of others is rushed, or occurs as infrequently as annual performance conversations, employees are lacking a powerful performance tool. Providing specific, positive feedback has been scientifically proven to lead to success. It should be given freely and regularly by everyone in an organization.

Who deserves your recognition today?

3. Promote curiosity, and really listening. 

At Fierce, we start all of our one-on-one conversations with the same question: Given everything on your plate, what is the most important thing you and I should be talking about today? And then… we allow the time and space for the person to reflect and respond.  As Henry David Thoreau once said, “The greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what I thought and attended to my answer.”

Healthy work relationships require time and space for conversations to happen and for all parties to actively listen. Employees must go beyond day-to-day transactional interactions and have real conversations.

When it comes to increasing efficiency, encouraging employees to slow down to have skillful conversation is essential. The world is constantly changing around us, and it is pivotal that employees feel comfortable checking in with their team and the strategies that are currently in motion.

The Fierce approach is to explore more deeply what is happening. If you sense something is not going as planned or you are noticing something under the surface with your employees, it is imperative to slow down, have the conversation, and get curious about what is really going on and teach them how to do the same.

Last spring, I got a fancy new title: Vice President of Global and Channel Partnerships. This new fancy title also came with the task to support our company’s mission — to change the world, one conversation at a time.

My primary goal? To take something that existed within Fierce and transform it into something that would ultimately champion the organization into becoming a truly global company.

This is a very lofty task for anyone no matter your business’ size.

Our President shared that this first year of my transformation plan I would be supported with the budget of my creativity and the strength of her support – two things I’ve relied on for the better part of a decade, so I happily agreed.

Day one into my new role, with my 90-day plan empty and staring back at me begging to be filled in, I suddenly realized that my accomplishment of this goal would be almost entirely based on others. I would need to find a way to strategically align with people outside of my team in order to be truly successful in my efforts.

As someone who subscribes to the adage of, “if it’s meant to be, it’s up to me,” this was terrifying.

With no team and no budget, my colleagues would have to support what I was building not because they had to, but because they wanted too. Because they believed in what I was building, believed in me. That means that what was up to me, was driving and building deeper relationships because ultimately, my relationships with others were going to determine my results — my strategic goals’ success wasn’t in my hands alone.

CONNECTING THE DOTS

Now, I haven’t always spent my career at Fierce. I have worked at a large corporation where I was one of hundreds of thousands. I’ve also worked at a small start-up where I was one of five.

What I’ve learned, is that no matter the company size or how much resources a team or organization has, in the end, the true work of getting something accomplished is rooted in the relationships of people who are working together.

I’ve seen when the antithesis of this is true when there is a lot of money to throw at a problem but because the relationships were not strong enough and there was no trust, the ultimate goal was not reached.

So here I am, starting in my new role and grounded in the reality that my first 90 days must include strategically aligning a team of people who don’t report to me, who don’t care about my fancy title, but do trust me, and do believe in our vision.

I’ll tell you that this was incredibly difficult. While I always felt that my colleagues supported me, sometimes I felt the limits of that support as they grappled with their assigned workload and my asks and requests were extra work.

So, the question was: how was I going to respond to this? What was I going to do to build that relationship in order to get what I and Fierce needed to be accomplished?

Luckily again, I had the tool of conversations: C=R, also known around Fierce as the conversation equals the relationship. I remember the first time I sat through a Fierce workshop, almost a decade ago, and heard this concept. I was young in my career and it hit me right in the gut.

Being a bit of a Type A personality, I loved it, because it was something I could control.

Whatever you put into the conversation, that is what you’ll get out of the relationship. If you have authentic conversations, you’ll have an authentic relationship. It’s such a simple concept, however, in practice, it can be quite difficult.

Why is it so hard? Because it takes energy, and it takes guts.

PUTTING CONCEPT TO ACTION

For me, and this first year with my new fancy title, I came up short quite a bit in this arena at times. I didn’t confront certain behaviors because I didn’t want to “rock the boat.” I didn’t want to upset a colleague who was helping me but, in fact, some of their help was slowing me down. I was not authentic with them, and so the relationship over time had thinness to it on my side, and I think on theirs too.

I didn’t delegate well to those who agreed to help, so there was a lot of frustration at times on both sides. I delegated like an all or nothing sum game rather than looking at it strategically and with the tools at my disposal.

There were also times I didn’t stop to realize the impact of my ask – simple from my point of view but completely void of the full context of the person on the other end.

I know I left people who were helping me feeling a bit underwhelmed and I think even hurt. Completely unintentional on my part but that’s the thing about how we make others feel – it’s not about us.

So, it’s a new year, I still have my fancy title and now a team and budget, but in reality, my work will live or die by the relationships with others who don’t report to me, and for those who now do, I still have to have a super strong relationship with them or they won’t be inspired to give it their all.

The next step for me is figuring out what I am going to do differently this time around to ensure the growth of our company doesn’t die in its innovation stage.

Below are three areas that I’m putting a strong emphasis on this year and where I recommend you do as well to guarantee you succeed too:

1) Confront behavior right away

This may seem antithetical to building stronger relationships, but it’s actually the best way to be effective.

This is because it’s incredibly important to remember that the person you need to confront is more often than not aware of the impact they are having on you, and that is on you to recognize.

For naysayers, just recently when talking about this with someone else, I literally said, “But I don’t want to make it a big deal.” To which that person said back to me: “Why is confrontation such a bad thing?”

That stopped me in my tracks.

It’s healthy for two people to see things differently, to have different perspectives, and when out of that an issue arises and we ignore it, that’s when we make it a big deal.

She then asked me, “If someone had an issue like this that involved you, would you want to know?” Of course, my answer is yes. I’m a people pleaser, I like giving feedback because it feels safe but still authoritative, however, it’s not always the conversation that is needed.

2) Delegate strategically

One of the first lessons I learned in my business life was being dele-dumped on is terrible. I never wanted to be that person that just gave people the tasks I didn’t want to do.

That train of thought, however, led me to think that everything I was responsible for was my sole obligation – which is false and a very selfish point of view because now I didn’t delegate tasks or strategic pieces of my role. I hoarded everything to myself and brought people in when I needed them which was confusing for others.

I’m currently working on a Delegation Tree, the tool in our Delegation Model at Fierce, for everything I own with my new fancy title. I’ve bucketed my responsibilities into three main groups, and I’m in the process of filling out the tree for those who report to me and those who are supporting the vision of what I’m trying to build.

This includes strategic work down to administrative tasks. After that, my goal is to set up meetings with each person, to talk through the decision tree and get their feedback, with the hope we land on responsibilities by the end of the quarter.

More clear conversations will lead to a relationship of trust.

3) Be responsible for my emotional wake

This is one of the 7 principles of Fierce – Take Responsibility for Your Emotional Wake. The idea is that you can either leave an aftertaste, an afterglow, or aftermath when interacting with someone.

I take pride that I think I’m pretty good at this philosophy. I am intuitive with people and yet, when I know I’ve made someone upset and I go back and apologize, I need to focus on the next step, which is to actually be able to ask: what feedback do you have for me on this? What am I missing around my ask?

Everyone is carrying a heavy load. At Fierce, we hire such passionate people — they show up 110% every day, and we pride ourselves on being lean and mighty.

That also means that there is a lot going on for every person within the organization. My “simple” ask may in fact not be simple at all. I had a colleague the other day ask me to stop saying something is “simple” in reference to design. Sure, the act itself might not be hard for our amazing designer but the coordination of that act, alongside everything else she is balancing is masterful and disciplined.

I’m also dedicated to bringing more people to strategic meetings early on, so they have more context and transparency behind my asks.

What holds me back, and I’m sure many leaders can relate, is I honestly feel bad sometimes inviting people to meetings. I know they’re busy and don’t want to take up more time. This is my issue and I have to trust, not assume, that they know what’s best for them.

My goal is that by getting curious with others, I’ll create relationships that have power behind them.

No matter what you do this year, it’s imperative that you realize no one can rely on fancy titles to get others to coalesce around our vision and strategy. It’s the relationships we build and ultimately the conversations we have that will or won’t determine our success.

Interested in reading more advice from Jaime to continue your leadership journey? Sign up on this page for our weekly newsletter and jumpstart your learning today!

When was the last time you stopped everything you were doing and sat in your own presence with zero — yes ZERO — interruptions?

In our busy, fast-paced society, it’s easy to forget we’re human beings and not robots taking on every and all tasks no matter the situation.

We have late nights pulling last-minute budget proposals together, we’re constantly responding to those urgent email requests from our CIO over the weekend instead of spending time with family, and we answer client phone calls at any hour of the day regardless of what is going on in our lives.

That’s a lot of work and very little time for YOU — and it’s a persistent problem for most Americans.

Compared to 38 other countries, the United States comes in at number 30 for work-life balance, according to Family Living Today.

Of employed adults surveyed, 33 percent say they work on the weekends and holidays, nearly 12 percent say they work 50 or more hours per week, and 57 percent say technology has ruined the modern-day family dinner.

You’d think all of this extra work would mean we’ve got the most productive, accomplished workers in the world, and yet that couldn’t be farther from reality.

In the same survey, 60 percent of employees say because of this poor work-life balance culture, they’ve experienced poor morale at the office, while 36 percent say it has caused poorer productivity and 41 say they have seen higher turnover and burnout within their organizations.

Scary, right?

The obvious solution to rebalancing life and work is to make it a more even playing field. There are countless ways businesses can go about this, including encouraging fun in the workplace, as well as assessing workloads and employee capacity, but one way that employees have been begging from companies is sabbaticals.

Now, before you jump at the idea of allowing your employees to up and leave the company for a few months and think I’m crazy for suggesting this will lead you to higher profits and productivity, let’s look at some statistics:

• 75 percent of employed Americans say they would like to take an extended break
• 53 percent say they’d like the opportunity of an extended break to escape the stress of their work life
• 43 percent say they believe that taking a sabbatical would make them more employable
• 37 percent say they feel a sabbatical would make them more confident at work

Sabbaticals are clearly a highly sought-after perk in the workplace to foster a better work-life balance.

Yet, there’s a disconnect in organizations providing this solution — according to a survey by the Society for Human Resource Management, 13 percent of companies offer an unpaid sabbatical, while only 5 percent of companies offer paid sabbaticals.

So, what gives? What is standing in the way?

Let’s look at the common fears surrounding this offer, and then we’ll tell you reasons to overcome them.

Reduced Productivity: Often, employers wonder how they will cover someone’s responsibilities if they are out of the office for an extended amount of time. If you haven’t built a strong bench and delegated effectively, then productivity will most likely suffer. Which leads right into our next fear…

Cost: A day off with pay is one of the costliest benefits an employer can provide. Not only are you continuing benefits and pay (for companies offering paid sabbaticals), but you may also incur expenses to hire temporary workers and/or deal with the effects of a downturn in productivity.

They Won’t Come Back: Many employers fear that their employees simply won’t return to their jobs if given time and space to evaluate their current situation. This is the most commonly cited reason employers withhold this perk.

Now, let’s look at the flip side – the top 5 reasons why sabbaticals can be a KEY benefit to not only your employees but also your company’s bottom line.

1. Increased Productivity Interestingly enough, our first reason why sabbaticals are a great benefit for companies is actually one of the common fears of not offering the perk we called out above.Instead of focusing on the fear of how you will cover someone’s responsibilities when they are out of the office, think about this: Employees returning from sabbatical are often recharged and re-invigorated. Having a steady stream of personnel coming in with renewed vigor and enthusiasm for their jobs and their company spells increased productivity.
2. Team Development Sabbaticals offer a prime opportunity for employers to develop their bench if they haven’t been doing so already.If you are leading your team effectively, any employee should be able to walk away from their job having the personnel ready and able to assume responsibility.It’s not only an essential key to leadership development, but it also provides the other team members with the valuable experience of learning about the business by filling in the gaps.If leveraged properly, this is on-the-job training at its best and there is no loss of productivity.
3. Fresh Perspective Some companies recognize the value in new perspectives. By cleverly devising policies around inviting new-hires to as many strategic meetings within their first six months on the job as possible, organizations get their ideas and feedback before they become part of the more limited group think. Offering long-time employees sabbatical can reintroduce this much-needed fresh perspective providing a “best of both worlds” scenario where someone intimately familiar with your company can provide ideas typically only gained from highly paid consultants.
4. Retention With the cost of replacing a manager averaging 150 percent of their salary (not to mention time and institutional knowledge lost), turnover can be HUGE to an organization’s bottom line.In the end, it’s a fairly simple equation: The cost of keeping someone happy is a heck of a lot less than replacing them. Given that sabbaticals are so coveted, this is a no-brainer.
   
5. Recruiting Who doesn’t want to work for a company who clearly shows they care about their employees’ happiness?Often, added benefits and perks provide the choice point between a sought-after recruit choosing your company or the competition. Remember that statistic from earlier — 13 percent of companies offer an unpaid sabbatical, while only 5 percent of companies offer paid sabbaticals.Employees will be attracted to your company if you show you are willing to go above and beyond to provide them the perks (like paid sabbaticals) they desire.All in all, providing sabbaticals is a great idea for employers looking to develop, retain, and recruit the best employees while creating a culture rich in energy, appreciation, and productivity.

Is your organization actively fostering happiness amongst its employees? Better yet, does it even matter if employees are happy or not? Spoiler alert — it definitely does.

Gallup reports that between 55 and 80 percent of employees believe it’s normal to see work as something to be endured, not enjoyed, while according to Forbes, happy employees are up to 20 percent more productive than unhappy employees.

Imagine one of your employees jamming out on a guitar, lifting weights at the gym, or reading a textbook.

You may not make an immediate connection between these behaviors and revenue or results, but can these types of activities influence your bottom line? You bet they can, and it all comes down to encouraging personal development.

Imagine your employees coming into work each day feeling more rested, more accomplished, and that their employer truly cares about them. When employees know you care about their growth, they respond. It builds trust, commitment, and a host of other benefits that impact the bottom line.

Let’s break it down. Here are some big benefits your organization stands to gain by supporting employee personal development:

Retention. The average length of time employees spend at an organization is 4.6 years, while millennials stay with companies even less at an average rate of 3.2 years, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That kind of turnover gets expensive quickly.

Employees want to be part of an organization that facilitates their growth, and if it doesn’t, they’re likely to leave and take their talents elsewhere. A Better Buys survey found that retention rates are 34 percent higher for employees with access to development opportunities.

Engagement. When people feel their circumstances align with their values (such as growth), they are happier and more engaged because they feel valued and inspired by a sense of meaning. Tom Path, author of “Are You Fully Charged” says “the odds of being completely engaged in your job increases by 250 percent if you work on meaningful projects each day.”

Pursuing interests and goals related to learning, regardless of what they are, is individually nurturing and often builds skills that are translatable to the workplace. That employee jamming out on a guitar from earlier? Think about the stress they will blow off (and not bring to the office) while playing an instrument that they are passionate about, or the discipline and time management skills they’ll take back to the workplace from mastering their instrument.

Culture. Personal development supports a growth mindset and growth-oriented culture, not to mention creativity and innovation. Here are Fierce, we strongly believe you are the culture and it does not exist outside of you — as people develop and grow, your workplace culture will, too.

So, how can you provide development opportunities to your employees?

1. Offer personal development funds

Personal development funds allow employees to spend an allotted amount of money on any type of activity they choose. This could include anything from a music class to a pottery class or even a gym membership.

2. Allow flex time

If an employee is taking on-campuses courses or pursuing an interest that falls inside normal work hours, consider offering flex time. Flex time requires employees to work a set number of hours but during days and times that function with their pursuits outside of work. Accountability is needed here —give trust and hold your employees “able.”

3. Offer tuition reimbursement

Tuition reimbursement is an exciting incentive for employees who are interested in ongoing formal education. Higher education, especially in the United States, can be an astronomical out of pocket expense. Tuition reimbursement offers incentive for employees to bring new knowledge and skills to the workplace when they know they will be at least partially reimbursed for their investment of time and money.

4. Provide learning opportunities

Offer opportunities to educate employees on the latest advancements in training, technology, and industry. In addition to offering leadership development and training, stay up-to-date on unique opportunities such as local learning events and online courses. Offer to cover entry or sign-up fees if possible.

5. Offer participant-driven learning

Support autonomy and personal development by giving employees choices when it comes to what they’re learning and how they’re learning. Take different learning styles into consideration and provide options that allow employees to work at their own pace and in whatever manner will help them retain the information they learn.

6. Ask!

Have a conversation with employees individually. Ask them how they want to develop and what would help them feel more supported and satisfied. There’s no better way to provide personal development opportunities that will make a real impact at your organization than by asking employees directly what would make them happier workers.

It’s incredibly important to let your employees know that you not only support their personal growth, but you follow through by offering real opportunities.